Background

Notes and format last updated May 7, 2020

Starting on the May 7th update, the NY Times began including probable covid cases/deaths along with confirmed. This mostly affects death counts – for certain geographies that include probable COVID deaths in addition to confirmed, these are now added to the totals. For the time being, they were all added to the May 6th totals, causing a big spike at the U.S. level. Over time, NY Times will revise their historical counts and distribute these added deaths when they actually occurred, so the spike should fade.

Growth rates

Heat maps

  • The two heat maps below compare how quickly total cases or deaths have grown at various times in our respective geopgraphies.
  • The first plot compares growth rate for total cases; the second, growth rate for total deaths.
  • The metric used is doubling time, by which I mean how quickly total cases or deaths are doubling.
  • The plots track that doubling time at each date for our geographies. Darker colors reflect shorter doubling times, and thus periods of faster growth.
    • You can use the plots to track each geography over time and to compare the geographies to one another.
    • You can also compare the cases and death charts, to see how faster periods of death growth follow faster periods of case growth.

Case growth rates

  • This section charts the growth rate of both total and new cases for each of our respective geographies. Each geography has its own chart, and then that chart will have a trendline for total cases and new cases.
    • There are only plots for the U.S. and states because the numbers for the counties are too small to generate worthwhile trendlines in this section.
  • Note that we’re charting growth rate and not a count of cases, so don’t think of these as the standard “curve” that we hear about in the news and that we want to flatten. Instead, these growth rate charts help track more precisely what we can only estimate when we see those other curves. For these growth rate charts, if the line is above zero, the metric we are tracking (total or new cases) is continuing to grow. If the growth rate line is going up, it’s growing more quickly each day; if it’s going down but still above zero, it’s growing less quickly (but still growing). Only when the growth rate lines go below zero has the metric stopped growing.
  • Each of these two lines uses rolling windows to calculate a growth rate for that particular metric. I do the calculation differently for each to smooth out some of the large day-to-day discrepancies in new case reporting at the state level.
    • For total cases, the trendlines are a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rates in total cases. We want to see these decline (and almost all are), but they can’t go below zero. This is because we’re tracking growth rate and a growth rate line below zero would mean total cases have gone down, which can’t happen. They can only grow less quickly, which means we want to see the total case line get as close to zero as possible.
    • For new cases, the trendlines show a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rate in the rolling 7-day average of new cases. Including two rolling periods in this average helps smooth out crazy spikes at the state level that result from large day-to-day changes. Unlike the lines for total cases, we want to watch for the lines for new cases to get consistently below zero and stay there. That means that we are consistently seeing fewer new cases on a daily basis.

U.S.

Our states

Death growth rates

  • This section charts the growth rate of both total and new deaths for each of our respective geographies. Each geography has its own chart, and then that chart will have a trendline for total deaths and new deaths.
    • There are only plots for the U.S. and states because the numbers for the counties are too small to generate worthwhile trendlines in this section.
  • Note that we’re charting growth rate and not a count of deaths, so don’t think of these as the standard “curve” that we hear about in the news and that we want to flatten. Instead, these growth rate charts help track more precisely what we can only estimate when we see those other curves. For these growth rate charts, if the line is above zero, the metric we are tracking (total or new deaths) is continuing to grow. If the growth rate line is going up, it’s growing more quickly each day; if it’s going down but still above zero, it’s growing less quickly (but still growing). Only when the growth rate lines go below zero has the metric stopped growing.
  • Each of these two lines uses rolling windows to calculate a growth rate for that particular metric. I do the calculation differently for each to smooth out some of the large day-to-day discrepancies in new death reporting at the state level.
    • For total deaths, the trendlines are a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rates in total deaths. We want to see these decline (and almost all are), but they can’t go below zero. This is because we’re tracking growth rate and a growth rate line below zero would mean total deaths have gone down, which can’t happen. They can only grow less quickly, which means we want to see the total death line get as close to zero as possible.
    • For new deaths, the trendlines show a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rate in the rolling 7-day average of new deaths. Including two rolling periods in this average helps smooth out crazy spikes at the state level that result from large day-to-day changes. Unlike the lines for total deaths, we want to watch for the lines for new deaths to get consistently below zero and stay there. That means that we are consistently seeing fewer new deaths on a daily basis.

U.S.

Our states

By population rankings

This section tracks metrics for states and counties normalized for population (number of cases or deaths per million residents), and then compares these figures both for our geographies and the country overall.

States

  • This section shows tables ranking all 50 states for per populations rates of total cases, new cases, total deaths, and new deaths.
  • For each metric, in addition to the tables, the trends for the top states are plotted over time.
    • We only plot the top ten states for each metric so that the plots aren’t too crowded. But you can view the full 50-state rankings in the tables.

Total confirmed cases

Table of total confirmed cases per million residents (all 50 states)
Ranking State Cases Per Million
1 New York 21,009
2 New Jersey 20,068
3 Louisiana 18,121
4 Arizona 18,054
5 Rhode Island 16,651
6 Massachusetts 16,299
7 District of Columbia 15,623
8 Florida 14,051
9 Delaware 13,401
10 Connecticut 13,361
11 Mississippi 12,958
12 Illinois 12,504
13 Maryland 12,500
14 South Carolina 12,089
15 Alabama 12,046
16 Iowa 11,580
17 Nebraska 11,362
18 Georgia 11,127
19 Texas 10,188
20 Arkansas 10,039
21 Nevada 9,930
22 Tennessee 9,886
23 Utah 9,740
24 California 8,997
25 North Carolina 8,740
26 South Dakota 8,649
27 Virginia 8,614
28 Indiana 8,124
29 Pennsylvania 7,995
30 Michigan 7,918
31 Minnesota 7,763
32 New Mexico 7,554
33 Wisconsin 7,283
34 Kansas 7,262
35 Idaho 7,050
36 Colorado 6,640
37 North Dakota 5,995
38 Ohio 5,929
39 Washington 5,909
40 Oklahoma 5,765
41 Missouri 5,171
42 Kentucky 4,733
43 New Hampshire 4,495
44 Wyoming 3,429
45 Puerto Rico 3,249
46 Oregon 3,102
47 Alaska 2,671
48 Maine 2,661
49 West Virginia 2,542
50 Vermont 2,112
51 Montana 2,010
52 Hawaii 897

New confirmed cases

Table of new cases per million residents: rolling 3-day average (all 50 states)
Ranking State New Cases Per Million
1 Florida 496
2 Louisiana 431
3 Arizona 409
4 Alabama 372
5 South Carolina 362
6 Texas 351
7 Tennessee 312
8 Nevada 307
9 Georgia 306
10 Idaho 303
11 Mississippi 255
12 California 234
13 Oklahoma 217
14 Arkansas 213
15 Kansas 213
16 North Carolina 182
17 Utah 174
18 Wisconsin 143
19 Missouri 139
20 Nebraska 131
21 New Mexico 129
22 Washington 123
23 Montana 121
24 Iowa 118
25 Virginia 111
26 Ohio 106
27 Kentucky 103
28 Maryland 103
29 Rhode Island 103
30 North Dakota 101
31 Indiana 89
32 Minnesota 86
33 Delaware 84
34 District of Columbia 84
35 Alaska 82
36 Illinois 81
37 Colorado 75
38 Puerto Rico 75
39 Oregon 72
40 Michigan 71
41 Wyoming 70
42 Pennsylvania 66
43 West Virginia 58
44 South Dakota 57
45 New York 39
46 New Jersey 37
47 Massachusetts 36
48 Connecticut 32
49 Hawaii 16
50 New Hampshire 14
51 Vermont 11
52 Maine 9

Total deaths

Table of total deaths per million residents (all 50 states)
Ranking State Deaths Per Million
1 New Jersey 1,760
2 New York 1,650
3 Connecticut 1,228
4 Massachusetts 1,214
5 Rhode Island 931
6 District of Columbia 809
7 Louisiana 744
8 Michigan 634
9 Illinois 586
10 Maryland 552
11 Pennsylvania 547
12 Delaware 535
13 Mississippi 433
14 Indiana 413
15 Arizona 335
16 Colorado 303
17 New Hampshire 289
18 Georgia 285
19 Minnesota 276
20 New Mexico 265
21 Ohio 263
22 Alabama 246
23 Iowa 246
24 Virginia 233
25 Florida 210
26 Nevada 200
27 Washington 195
28 South Carolina 193
29 California 186
30 Missouri 185
31 Nebraska 156
32 North Carolina 152
33 Kentucky 149
34 Wisconsin 143
35 South Dakota 125
36 Texas 123
37 North Dakota 120
38 Tennessee 113
39 Arkansas 111
40 Oklahoma 109
41 Kansas 105
42 Vermont 89
43 Maine 84
44 Utah 72
45 Idaho 62
46 Oregon 59
47 West Virginia 54
48 Puerto Rico 53
49 Wyoming 38
50 Montana 31
51 Alaska 20
52 Hawaii 14

New deaths

Table of new deaths per million residents: rolling 3-day average (all 50 states)
Ranking State New Deaths Per Million
1 Arizona 9
2 Alabama 6
3 Florida 4
4 Mississippi 4
5 New Jersey 4
6 Louisiana 3
7 Rhode Island 3
8 Texas 3
9 California 2
10 Connecticut 2
11 Georgia 2
12 Iowa 2
13 Massachusetts 2
14 Nevada 2
15 North Carolina 2
16 South Carolina 2
17 Tennessee 2
18 Washington 2
19 Arkansas 1
20 Colorado 1
21 Delaware 1
22 District of Columbia 1
23 Idaho 1
24 Illinois 1
25 Indiana 1
26 Kentucky 1
27 Maryland 1
28 Minnesota 1
29 Missouri 1
30 Montana 1
31 Nebraska 1
32 New Mexico 1
33 New York 1
34 Pennsylvania 1
35 Utah 1
36 Virginia 1
37 Alaska 0
38 Hawaii 0
39 Kansas 0
40 Maine 0
41 Michigan 0
42 New Hampshire 0
43 North Dakota 0
44 Ohio 0
45 Oklahoma 0
46 Oregon 0
47 Puerto Rico 0
48 South Dakota 0
49 Vermont 0
50 West Virginia 0
51 Wisconsin 0
52 Wyoming 0

Counties

  • This section focuses on the county level. It shows tables with our counties ranked by percentile of U.S. counties for per population rates of total cases and total deaths.
    • Each table also shows the top five counties in the country in addition to our counties, for added perspecive.
  • In addition to the tables, our counties’ percentile for both total cases and total deaths are plotted over time.

Confirmed cases

Table showing total cases per million and percentile for all US counties. Includes our counties and the top 5 in the US for perspective.
County State Cases Per Million Raw Ranking Percentile
Trousdale Tennessee 134,350 1 99
Lake Tennessee 99,487 2 99
Lee Arkansas 96,082 3 99
Dakota Nebraska 92,929 4 99
Buena Vista Iowa 88,736 5 99
Davidson Tennessee 22,700 125 96
Richland South Carolina 13,020 418 86
Orange California 8,512 773 75
York South Carolina 7,339 922 70
Pierce Washington 4,171 1539 51

Our county percentiles over time

Deaths

Table showing total deaths per million and percentile for all US counties. Includes our counties and the top 5 in the US for perspective.
County State Deaths Per Million Raw Ranking Percentile
Hancock Georgia 3,902 1 99
Randolph Georgia 3,688 2 99
Terrell Georgia 3,399 3 99
Early Georgia 3,042 4 99
Emporia city Virginia 2,806 5 99
Richland South Carolina 238 679 78
Davidson Tennessee 226 707 77
Orange California 143 966 69
Pierce Washington 126 1050 66
York South Carolina 46 1672 46

Our county percentiles over time

Raw counts

Total confirmed cases

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

New confirmed cases

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

Total deaths

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

New deaths

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

Stay-at-home comparisons